Bill's Auto Repair Bill DeRhodes

I dropped my 1999 Ford F-150 pickup truck at Bill’s Auto Repair for repairs to the engine. All vehicle doors and the tailgate were locked. I gave the key personally to the owner, Bill DeRhodes. When he returned the vehicle to me the tailgate was gone. He claimed he did not even notice it was missing and that he did not know what happened to it. The vehicle was never out of his possession and he had the only key. You cannot steal a tailgate without having the key to first unlock it. Further, he refused to do anything about it. He refused to call the police or to file a report with his insurance company. In fact, when I first asked him what happened to the tailgate he laughed, then offered to get me a new tailgate and install it — for a price, of course. I have since discovered that tailgates for this vehicle are rare and very expensive, hard-to-find, and there is a huge “black market” for them. One would think that if you entrust your vehicle to a business person, and while it is in their possession it incurs over $1,000.00 in damages, they would want to make it right. Mr. DeRhodes made absolutely no effort toward being helpful, except to try to “extort” more money from me to “repair” the damage that had occured while he had possession of the truck. He has yet to even apologize, let alone cooperate. I would not trust this man with a bicycle, let alone a motor vehicle. Alan East Palestine, OhioU.S.A.